Rwanda Nyampinga

Now Fair Trade certified, Nyampinga is an all-women’s cooperative located in Southern Rwanda near the country’s border with Burundi. In 2013, Bloomberg Philanthropies partnered with Sustainable Harvest to develop a not-for-profit training institute for women small-crop farmers. Now known as Sustainable Growers, it has enrolled over 40,000 women across Rwanda and Congo, and more recently began enrolling women from rural cooperatives in Tanzania. As part of this program, the women of Nyampinga have received training in agronomy, market access, and quality control. The farmer's hard work and enhanced knowledge of coffee production has resulted in resounding improvements in cup quality in a short period of time.

Before working with Sustainable Growers, co-op members sold coffee cherries at low prices in the local market, but now they have established a cooperatively owned wet mill and formalized exporting procedures, securing the ability to be compensated fairly for their hard work, and the beautiful coffees that they produce.